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“Here,” she said with a chuckle, not thinking anything of it as she reached forward and swiped the hair away from his temple.
Zach’s eyes roved over her face, and she was close enough as she pushed his hair back into place that she could feel his breath stirring against her skin.
“Colette,” he whispered, her name falling softly from his lips.
She met his gaze, her smile fading when she noticed the emotions in his eyes. The air between them became charged, and Colette’s breath hitched as Zach leaned toward her. He paused for a moment, his gaze dipping from her lips and then back up to her eyes, a silent request for permission.
Colette nodded, leaning up on the tips of her toes as he bent the last few inches to brush his lips to hers. The moment their mouths met, it was as if all the atoms in her body shifted. Zach’s large, strong arms wrapped around her waist, and it was as if the two of them fit together like perfect puzzle pieces. Colette was certain that he must be able to feel the fierce pounding of her heart.
When they broke apart, they were both a bit breathless, and Colette was grinning as her head spun. She couldn’t recall the last time she had been kissed quite like that. Actually, yes, she could. She hadneverbeen kissed like that.
He looked at her sheepishly, almost shyly, and Colette’s heart did another somersault. She suddenly wondered if she had done something wrong, if she had overstepped some boundary, but those worries were quickly dashed when Zach gave her a gentle smile before leaning forward and pressing a sweet, chaste kiss to her forehead.
“Should we go back downstairs?” he asked, reaching down to lace their fingers together.
Butterflies danced through Colette’s stomach. She felt like she was venturing into uncharted territory, which was both thrilling and terrifying. But she pushed aside her fears as she nodded at him, allowing the handsome man to lead her back down the stairs of the house that she loved so much.
CHAPTERSEVENTEEN
The door to the bakery chimed loudly as a customer walked out, and Sarah fought hard to not let her disappointment show on her face. Once again, someone had asked about the chocolate peanut butter cupcakes ‘just like Baking Fiend’s,’ and she’d had to tell the person that Sweet Thing didn’t sell them. At this point, she was contemplating trying to make something like it and putting her own spin on it, just to stop customers from heading to Mindy’s shop like the person who’d just left was doing.
Sarah glanced around the bakery. Will was in the corner, his laptop open in front of him as he helped someone with their budgeting spreadsheet. She smiled softly at the sight. William was always doing things like that, helping anyone in town who expressed even the mildest bit of confusion over their finances. His eagerness to help others was one of the things she loved the most about him.
The rest of the shop, however, was entirely empty, and something about that fact made her nervous. Sarah shifted her weight back and forth between each leg, trying to remind herself of all of William’s advice about minding her own business and how everything would work out in the end.
But as the minutes ticked by and not a single person who passed by on the sidewalk so much as glanced at the bakery, there was only one thought that kept occupying Sarah’s mind. Finally, when she could take no more of it, she huffed out a sigh and cast another look toward William. He was so absorbed in his work that he didn’t notice as she slipped the apron off her head and strode into the back room.
Sarah walked into the office, grabbing a scarf from the back of a chair and wrapping it around her neck and the bottom half of her face, obscuring some of her features. She pulled on her coat and her hood, and at the last second, she grabbed a pair of oversized sunglasses that were sitting on the desk and thrust them on. Satisfied that she was entirely disguised, she shoved her hands into her pockets and slipped out the front door, heading through town.
No one glanced in her direction as she weaved in and out of the shoppers milling about, and Sarah took that as confirmation that her disguise was working.
“I just need to know,” she muttered to herself, sure that she’d sound like a loon if anyone could hear her, but not completely caring.
She made it to Baking Fiend in no time at all, and she stopped in her tracks in front of the building. It looked the same in person as it had that day on the news, and she took in the charming brick facade of the shop with the large bay windows where customers sat at wrought iron tables.
A woman exited the shop, one whom Sarah didn’t recognize, so she knew it had to be someone from out of town. The woman stopped, smiling happily as she reached into the delicate white pastry bag that she clutched in her hand and extracted a large bear claw pastry.
The pastry looked delightful, cooked to a buttery soft brown and drizzled in icing that made her mouth water just looking at it.
“How is your pastry?” Sarah blurted, taking a few steps toward the woman before she could think too much of it.
The woman blinked at her mid-bite, taking a few seconds to chew and then swallow.
“Is it any good?” Sarah prompted again, giving the woman an expectant look.
“It’s the best bear claw I’ve ever had,” the woman answered honestly, looking at Sarah as if she had lost her marbles. Which maybe she had.
Sarah nodded. “Good, good.” But the words sounded a little hollow.
Understandably, the woman didn’t say anything else to her as she walked past, taking another bite of her pastry and mumbling to herself about crazy people. Sarah glanced at the bakery again, curiosity welling up inside her, and this time she couldn’t tamp it down.
She plowed forward with determined steps, unable to stop herself as she pushed open the door to Baking Fiend and stepped inside. She had hoped that being there would ease her fears, but as she looked around the space, it only served to make her belly roil into knots.
“Oh, no,” she murmured under her breath. “It’s adorable.”
And it was. There were black and white tile floors, and old-fashioned décor complemented by soft pastel colors on the walls. The display case for Mindy’s desserts and pastries was huge, almost double the one Sarah had at Sweet Thing, and it was backlit by a softly glowing light. Sarah crept forward, her eyes roving over the contents in the case, taking in the names.
There were the peanut butter and chocolate cupcakes everyone had been raving about. The bear claw she had spotted in the woman’s hand just outside. Glazed cranberry donuts, beautiful cinnamon rolls, and giant cookies. All of it was making her mouth water.
